Scott's Photographica Collection

Sands & Hunter
Improved Tourist Camera

 

Sands & Hunter Improved Tourist Camera
Sands & Hunter Improved Tourist Camera

The Improved Tourist is a finely crafted brass-bound mahogany 1/2 plate camera capable of taking both stereo and single photographs.  The stereo images are a generous 1/4 plate size or approximately 3 x 4 inches each.  By shifting the lens board and capping one lens, single non-stereo photographs can be taken.

Sands & Hunter was a long-lived London, England camera manufacturer and retailer.  The name of the firm changed over time, progressing from Hunter & Sands; Sands & Hunter; Sands, Hunter & Company and finally Sands, Hunter & Company Ltd.  The maker's name appears as Sands & Hunter on this particular camera indicating it must have been manufactured sometime between 1883 and 1892.

This example does not have a shutter.  If one existed at some time in its past, it would have probably been an accessory attachment fitted over the lenses.  In the absence of a shutter it was fairly common to control exposure by removing and replacing the lens caps.  The lenses are f/8 Thornton Pickard Beck Symmetricals with iris diaphragms.  The bellows is a deep red color.  The Improved Tourist is a tailboard design with a side wing for extra rigidity.

Back View of Improved Tourist Camera
Back View of Improved Tourist Camera

 

Closed Improved Tourist Camera
Closed Improved Tourist Camera

 

Maker's Nameplate
Maker's Nameplate

 

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Page created June 19, 2001; updated December 20, 2020